


Love Like Starlight

by literarytonguetied



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Domestic Fluff, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Mentions of Anxiety (minor)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2021-01-13 07:41:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21240572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/literarytonguetied/pseuds/literarytonguetied
Summary: It’s easy to forget that theirs isn’t young love, isn’t something new, isn’t their first handheld stroll. Every matched step and every side glance and every shared smile still blooms butterflies and the fresh feeling of falling in love.





	Love Like Starlight

**Author's Note:**

> This was my contribution to the P5 Wedding Zine! I am late with this as I am late in all things in my life, schwoops, but I love Ryuji and I love Goro and they love each other.

Sunlight is warm through the window, gold with dawn and slow to fill the room. Most of their mornings are slow, now, tangled as they are together with bird chirps and soft snoring and the gentle sounds of the world waking outside their home. 

Goro lays awake, like most mornings, content to watch the sun rise and strike Ryuji honey sweet. He smiles into his pillow, into Ryuji’s hair, into the new day. It seems more brilliant as Ryuji adjusts in his arms, and Goro thinks about the small little box with the small little band that is hidden in his coat pocket and the big words that sit heavy on his tongue. He has plans, but the anxiety sitting in the pit of his stomach can’t quell how Goro’s smile grows. 

“Hey,” Goro murmurs and presses a kiss to Ryuji’s temple, “wake up.”

Ryuji huffs, mumbles something, buries his head into Goro’s shoulder and wipes drool on him. 

Goro gently cards his fingers through Ryuji’s hair, “Darling, that’s disgusting.” 

Ryuji rasps a laugh. He cranes his neck up to look at Goro with sleep bleary eyes and mussed hair and a crooked smile. Goro leans down to kiss him and makes a show at grimacing at his morning breath. Ryuji chuckles again, “You’re no morning daisy yourself, babe.” He croaks and pecks him before rolling out of bed. Ryuji stretches and groans and turns back to Goro with a smile that blinds. “So, what’s the plan since you’ve got me up so early?”

Goro brushes past him and heads towards the bathroom. “Plan? I’m not sure what you mean, perhaps I just wanted to—” 

“Babe,” Ryuji slings his arms around Goro’s hips and sets his chin on Goro’s shoulder.

“I was thinking about going to see the cherry blossoms today. I hear they should be in full bloom. 

Maybe we could get some crepes and take a stroll through the park?” He hands Ryuji his toothbrush. 

Ryuji’s grin is huge in the mirror, and it’s hard for Goro to affect nonchalance when happiness sticks to his ribs and presses against his lungs, sweet enough to make him breathless. 

“I’d love to,” Ryuji tells him and kisses toothpaste from the corner of Goro’s mouth. 

The air is crisp with early spring when they leave, and Ryuji doesn’t hesitate to grab Goro’s hand. He laces their fingers together and thumbs across Goro’s knuckles, hot against the waning chill in the air. Goro bumps him with his shoulder in return. It’s easy to forget that theirs isn’t young love, isn’t something new, isn’t their first handheld stroll. Every matched step and every side glance and every shared smile still blooms butterflies and the fresh feeling of falling in love.

Words build behind Goro’s teeth and he swallows them, focuses instead on the taste of Ryuji’s laughter and the callouses against his palm and the gentle scuff of Ryuji just barely dragging his heels. 

They have a favorite crepe place and Ryuji leads them there without thinking. It’s just down the way from their apartment and is stuck between two towering buildings, a splash of color amongst swaths of grey. 

Ryuji only lets go of his hand to order for them, and Goro takes the opportunity to pull out his phone and quickly send a group text. He confirms the plan with everyone involved, double checking that they all know the time and location. There’s a surge of text notifications as people respond, some earnest and excited while others bite in sarcastic reassurance.

“Wow, sounds like you’re popular today.” Ryuji hands him his crepe, smeared with chocolate and piled high with whipped cream. 

“Just work things,” Goro says and accepts his crepe. His phone buzzes a few more times, short, repeating spurts that are muffled by his pocket. That press against the ring. 

“Do you need to get them?” His concern makes Goro soften, and he steals a strawberry from Ryuji’s crepe.

“I have more important things to handle right now,” Goro says around the strawberry and Ryuji swipes a finger through Goro’s whipped cream in retaliation. 

Ryuji hums around the taste, “Am I the thing you have to handle?” 

“Something like that,” Goro chuckles behind his hand, doesn’t protest when Ryuji grabs it to hold, doesn’t protest when Ryuji chases the taste of strawberry on his lips. “Come on,” Goro says, “At this rate, all the blossoms will have fallen by the time we get there.” 

Even without the cherry trees along the stretch of road they walk down, spring settles into the city comfortably. Everything is green and blooming, pressing through the careful lines and less careful cracks of concrete, climbing up dreary building sides and overflowing in planters that decorate the sidewalk. The sun shines lonely in a sea of sky and blooming flowers cover the smell of ozone. 

They turn a corner and there are petals before there is park; they overflow decorative gates in bruised piles pressed into the corners of the curb and the breaks in brick mortar and the clumsy fingers of small children. People spill out of the park just the same, with cameras and loved ones in hand, walking among the careful grid of picnic blankets. Crepe wrappings are disposed of before they enter the park and Ryuji grabs Goro’s hand again.

The sky is broken between the boughs like stained glass. Light filters soft in shadow pink and dappled along their shoulders like the petals had fallen there. Ryuji moves his hand to Goro’s hip, holds him close, and Goro can feel the line of heat where Ryuji’s side lines up with his. A breeze trickles through the trees, makes petals and leaves whisper against each other, looses a flurry of cherry blossoms, and they fall like gentle snow. 

Goro reaches to pull a petal from Ryuji’s hair and startles when something lands on his hand. There’s another stiff breeze and a cloud rolls over the sun. 

“Oh man,” Ryuji squints through the tree limbs at the dark, fat clouds rolling in, “do you think it’ll rain later?” 

Goro’s stomach drops. “Don’t jinx it,” he tries to make it lighthearted, tries to joke, but there’s an acrid taste in the back of his throat. The words are there, choking him with all the promises he intends to keep. He needs today to be perfect.

Ryuji just laughs, “Just our luck, huh? Well, a little rain never hurt anyone. Let’s keep going.” There’s adoration in his eyes. He cards his fingers through Goro’s hair and pulls out a petal, blowing it off the tips of his fingers. 

Thunder rumbles in the distance, far away but still too close. They only make it halfway out of the park when the downpour starts and they have to run the rest of the way, beating the rivers of flower petals that rush alongside them and into storm drains.

They take shelter under a store awning and the rain is a loud, staccato beat folded in on itself until each beat is indeterminate and unrecognizable. Disappointment makes it hard for Goro to catch his breath. 

He swallows hard, sees how Ryuji’s hair is flattened against his temples, and Goro thinks, “You’re so beautiful." Because looking at him makes it feel like the sun never slid behind the clouds, that the warmth of spring was never eaten by chilled after-winter rain. Because Ryuji is like starlight, ever bright even in pitch dark.

“Babe, come on!” Blush sits high on Ryuji’s cheekbones, drips down his neck and colors the tips of his ears. “You gotta warn a guy before sayin’ stuff like that!” 

Goro is hopelessly endeared, kisses him soft on the bridge of his nose, and Ryuji takes the opportunity to wrap his arms around Goro. They’re both soaking and slightly chilled, but it’s too easy to wrap up in each other and wait out the rain as thunder rolls above them in time to the flashes of lightning. 

There’s a tick of anxiety at the back of his mind the longer they wait, a looming deadline, so many people gathered at the restaurant. Goro tries to check his phone but Ryuji is tugging on his arm. “Come on, the rain is letting up, we should get out of here just in case it picks back up again.”

“I actually have a place I want to go for dinner if you’re up for it.” Goro says.

“Soaking wet?”

“I might have made reservation.” He’s trying to hide a grin but Ryuji just looks at him smugly.

“I knew you had a plan!” Goro waves him off.

“Yes, you’re the ultimate super sleuth. Let’s go I don’t want to risk losing our table.” The anxiety is back, the excitement. The rain had been an unwelcome deviation but the rest of the night was going to be perfect. A perfect dinner with everyone present when he—

“Can you call me the ultimate super sleuth again? I want to record it for my text tone.” Ryuji already has his phone out, using it to mostly obscure his grin, and Goro rolls his eyes.

“You only get the one.” He tugs Ryuji by their interlaced hands and Ryuji groans in defeat.

Goro had planned the day to all be within one walkable area, just in case. He didn’t want to have to contend with late trains or traffic or long lines. It’s only a few blocks to the restaurant, and there’s immediate relief seeing everyone he had invited standing in front, confirmation that everyone made it and that the rain had not deterred anyone. 

Stone cold dread slides into its place as he sees more than just family and friends standing there, as firefighters step into the building and police cordon off the entryway.

“Hey,” Ryuji says quietly to Goro, “what’s going on? Why is everyone here?” 

Ann is the first to spot them as they near the restaurant. She approaches Goro with apologies heavier than the rain, and Goro has to interrupt her.

“What happened?” Something ugly claws at Goro’s rib cage, presses on his clavicle and crawls up his neck. The ring in his pocket feels heavy enough to drag him six feet down. 

“There was an oil fire. They’re looking into it now, but the building was evacuated. Oh, Goro, I’m so sorry.” Ann doesn’t know what to do with her hands, can’t decide if she wants to reach out in solace or pick nervously at her own cuticles.

The rest of the party has gathered around them, Ryuji’s mother and all of their friends, all in various states of despondency and lamentation, apologies on the tips of their tongues like barbs.

Ryuji only looks at Goro and Goro can’t bring himself to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry, darling, today was supposed to be perfect and I think it ended up being the furthest thing from it.” He takes the box out of his pocket and can feel Ryuji’s sharp intake of breath. 

“What are you talking about?” Ryuji grabs Goro’s wrist and he whips his head up. “Today was more than perfect. It was time spent with you. It was a day that ended with everyone we love. What could be more perfect than that?” Ryuji steels his face and reaches into his back pocket. “I was going to do this next week, but you beat me to it.”

He pulls out a velvet box, very similar to the one in Goro’s hand, and Goro lets out a wet, surprised laugh. Ryuji opens the box to a small band and Goro does the same, the rings inside similar in design but inlaid in opposite directions.

“Akechi Goro, perfect as you are, will you marry me?” Ryuji grins crookedly at him, tears at the corners of his eyes.

“Dearest fiancé,” Goro cups his face, “I think you’ve stolen my line.” He tastes Ryuji’s laughter as they kiss. 

The rings catch the light, small as they are, twinkling like starlight.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, come hang out with me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/snarky_broad)!


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